Private Worlds

The Women Who Buy the Weekend Inside the discreet world of affluent women in their fifties and the younger women who share their private suites, distant islands, jewelry boxes—and sometimes their hearts. By Elise Marlowe The first thing Camille Laurent gives me is not an explanation. It is champagne. We are sitting in the corner suite of a hotel where the carpet is thick enough to silence footsteps and the curtains open electronically over a view that seems to belong to somebody else: slate-blue water, white yachts, a marina full of polished hulls catching the late-afternoon sun. Camille is fifty-six. She wears a cream trouser suit, a vintage gold watch and earrings with emeralds large enough to require confidence. She is married. Across from her, barefoot on the sofa, is Nina, twenty-nine, who has just returned from the hotel spa. Nina works—when she is home—as a freelance stylist. She is wearing one of Camille’s silk shirts and a narrow gold anklet set with tiny green stones. “Before you ask,” Camille says, following my eyes, “yes, I bought it.” Nina laughs. “She buys almost everything.” Camille looks at her. “Not everything.” That exchange—half joke, half correction—is the reason I have spent three months speaking to women like them. They are affluent women in their fifties, sometimes married, sometimes divorced, sometimes widowed, who have formed relationships with women roughly twenty to thirty years younger. The arrangements differ wildly. Some call them affairs. Some call them relationships. Some refuse labels altogether. Money is nearly always present. But money, I discover, is rarely the whole story. The Suite in Monte Carlo Camille met Nina at a charity exhibition in London. Camille had built her wealth alongside her husband, a property investor she married in her twenties. They have two adult children, several homes and what she describes as “a marriage that functions extremely well at everything except romance.” Her husband knows she travels with Nina. Whether he knows the full nature of the relationship is another matter. “He knows enough,” Camille tells me. Nina raises an eyebrow. “That means no.” Camille smiles into her glass. Their first weekend away was in Paris. Camille booked separate rooms. By the second evening, they were using only one. Since then there have been weekends in Venice and Monaco, ten days in the Maldives, shopping trips to Milan and an impulsive three-night stay in Marrakech because Nina once mentioned wanting to see the Majorelle Garden. The presents began cautiously. A scarf. A handbag. Then jewelry. “The first serious gift was a watch,” Nina says. “I nearly gave it back.” “Nearly,” Camille repeats. “I felt weird.” “Why?” “Because it cost more than my car.” Camille considers this. “I didn't buy it to control her. I bought it because I could.” That distinction matters enormously to both of them. Nina insists that she does not receive a formal allowance. Camille pays for almost all their travel and has helped Nina with rent twice during slow periods. “Does the money affect the relationship?” I ask. “Of course,” Nina says immediately. “Anyone who says it doesn't is lying.” Camille nods. This is the first surprise. There is no attempt to pretend that economic imbalance disappears because affection is present. Nina grew up in a household where holidays meant driving to relatives. Before Camille, she had never flown business class. “Now she complains about lounges,” Camille says. “I have evolved.” They both laugh. But Nina later tells me, when Camille has gone to take a call, that luxury can distort your sense of what is normal. “You come home from somewhere like this,” she says, looking around the suite, “and suddenly your flat feels tiny. Your supermarket wine tastes terrible. Your life hasn't actually got worse, but it feels like it has.” Does that make leaving harder? She pauses. “Yes.” Then she adds: “But loving somebody makes leaving harder too.” The Woman in the Emerald Dress Dr. Samira Rahman is fifty-eight and divorced. Unlike Camille, she has no interest in secrecy. She meets me in the restaurant of a grand hotel wearing a dark green silk dress and a matching emerald pendant. Her girlfriend, Leah, thirty-two, arrives twenty minutes later from work in jeans and trainers. The visual contrast is almost comic. Samira looks at her fondly. “She refuses to dress for the setting.” Leah kisses her cheek. “She dresses enough for both of us.” Samira is a consultant whose private investments have made her considerably wealthier than most of her colleagues realize. Her first marriage lasted twenty-four years. She began dating women after her divorce. “When I was younger,” she says, “there were versions of myself I simply didn't permit to exist.” Leah grew up with a single mother and worked from sixteen. She is now a physiotherapist. Their relationship began conventionally: dinner, theatre, a weekend in Edinburgh. Then came Florence. “Florence changed the scale,” Leah tells me. Samira booked a private terrace overlooking the Arno. There were flowers in the room. A driver met them at the airport. On their last evening, Samira gave Leah a slim diamond bracelet. Leah cried. Not because of the diamonds. “Because nobody had ever made an occasion out of me before.” Samira becomes noticeably quiet when Leah says this. Their arrangement is perhaps the least transactional of the women I meet, but money remains woven through it. Samira pays for holidays. Leah pays for dinner sometimes. “She becomes furious if I don't let her,” Samira says. “I bought us fish and chips last week.” “You did.” “And you survived.” Samira smiles. “I am extraordinarily adaptable.” They have been together for nearly three years. Leah keeps her own apartment. Samira owns three properties. Why not move in? Leah answers before Samira can. “Because I don't want to become a guest in somebody else's life.” That sentence stays with me. Gifts With Conditions Not every arrangement is as romantic. Victoria Hale, fifty-four, insists that I do not photograph her face. She is married, socially prominent and frightened—not of her husband, she tells me, but of becoming interesting to people who currently find her respectable. We meet in a private sitting room of a country hotel. Victoria wears navy cashmere and diamonds that look inherited. Her companion, Jade, twenty-six, wears a short black dress, high heels and absolutely no anxiety about being photographed. “I don't have a reputation to protect,” Jade says. Victoria winces. “That sounds awful.” “It's true.” Their relationship began two years ago through mutual friends. Victoria describes the arrangement as “companionship with intimacy.” Jade calls it “dating with excellent benefits.” Those benefits include travel, designer clothes, jewelry and a monthly contribution toward Jade's living costs. This is the closest any of the women I interview come to describing something explicitly negotiated. “I don't pretend there isn't an arrangement,” Victoria says. “There is.” Does she expect exclusivity? “Yes.” Jade gives a small smile. “Mostly.” Victoria turns toward her. “What does that mean?” “It means this interview is getting interesting.” For a moment, the polished room feels very small. Later, alone, Jade tells me the arrangement works because its boundaries are discussed. She knows what Victoria wants: attention, discretion, affection, companionship, physical closeness. Victoria knows what Jade wants: security, experiences and financial breathing room. “Is affection part of it?” I ask. Jade looks genuinely offended. “Obviously.” Would she be with Victoria if Victoria were not wealthy? A long silence. “Probably not.” Would she be with a wealthy woman she disliked? “No chance.” Both answers can apparently be true. The Widow and the Photographer At sixty, Margot Devereux is the oldest woman I interview. Her girlfriend, Sofia, is thirty-four. Margot's husband died six years ago. She speaks of him warmly and without embarrassment. “I adored him,” she says. “And I adore her. Life is not a courtroom. One love does not invalidate another.” They met when Sofia photographed one of Margot's properties for an architectural publication. Margot invited her to dinner. Then another. Then to Vienna. Sofia accepted. “People assume I was dazzled,” Sofia says. “And yes, I was. Have you seen Vienna at Christmas from a suite at the Sacher?” Margot laughs. “But I liked her before the suite.” Their relationship has lasted four years. Margot has given Sofia cameras, jewelry, trips and—most controversially—a studio. The studio is in Sofia's name. “That changed things,” Sofia admits. How? “It gave me something permanent.” Was Margot comfortable with that? “It was the purpose.” Margot understands the criticism. She knows that a gift substantial enough can become a form of gravity. “If I give Sofia something,” she says, “I have to be prepared for her to leave with it.” Sofia reaches across the table and takes her hand. “That is probably why I haven't.” What the Younger Women Say When the Older Women Leave the Room The most revealing conversations happen separately. Without their partners present, the younger women become more analytical. They talk about first-class flights and room-service breakfasts, but also about being mistaken for assistants, daughters and—in one particularly painful incident—a wealthy woman's hired companion. They talk about the thrill of being wanted by women who seem completely assured. And they talk about the imbalance. “When somebody can solve your financial problems with one phone call,” Nina tells me, “you have to be careful you don't start confusing gratitude with love.” Jade puts it differently. “Money is power. Pretending otherwise is childish. The question is whether the person uses that power against you.” Leah rejects the idea that youth is automatically the weaker position. “Samira has money,” she says. “I have something she doesn't.” What? “Time.” She smiles. “She hates when I say that.” And What the Older Women Admit The older women are equally candid when their younger partners leave. They talk about aging. About marriages that became administrative partnerships. About entering restaurants beside younger women and feeling simultaneously glamorous and exposed. About desire arriving after decades of behaving properly. One admits that generosity lets her feel useful. Another admits that she enjoys being admired. A third tells me that spending money on her girlfriend feels almost narcotic. “I spent thirty years being sensible,” she says. “Do you know how intoxicating it is to book somewhere absurd on Wednesday and be there by Friday?” There is vanity. There is loneliness. There is lust. There is tenderness. Often all four coexist. The Economics of Romance It would be easy to turn these women into a morality tale. The wealthy women could be cast as predators. The younger women could be cast as opportunists. Neither explanation survives prolonged conversation. Instead, what emerges is messier. A handbag can be both a present and a symbol of power. A holiday can be both romantic and impossible for one partner to afford independently. Financial support can liberate someone and complicate her ability to walk away. A relationship can begin because of glamour and survive because of love. The women themselves understand this better than outsiders assume. What distinguishes the healthiest arrangements I encounter is not the absence of money. It is the willingness to acknowledge it. Saturday Morning On my final morning with Camille and Nina, breakfast arrives on a silver trolley. There are berries, eggs, coffee and pastries neither woman touches. Camille has arranged another surprise. A jeweler has sent several pieces to the hotel. Nina rolls her eyes. “You promised.” “I promised nothing.” “You absolutely promised.” Camille opens a narrow velvet box. Inside is an anklet: white gold, tiny diamonds, almost understated by her standards. Nina stares at it. “No.” “Yes.” “No.” Camille lifts it from the box. Nina is laughing now. She stretches one leg across the end of the sofa. Camille fastens the clasp around her ankle. For a moment the scene seems almost too perfect: sunlight, diamonds, bare feet on an expensive carpet, two women staying somewhere most people will only ever see in photographs. Then Nina looks down at the jewelry. “What happens if we break up?” Camille does not hesitate. “You keep it.” “And the other things?” “Those too.” Nina studies her. “Even the watch?” Camille sighs. “Especially the bloody watch.” They both laugh. Outside, the boats remain in the harbor. Inside, the champagne from yesterday is gone, suitcases are half packed, and their flight leaves in three hours. Luxury, like romance, can create the illusion that ordinary rules have been suspended. But eventually somebody has to check out. The interesting question is what remains when they do.